Another Peter the Great.

I was just reading various bits and pieces about Peter Cheeseman CBE, the man who founded the theatre where I used to work and which he ran for thirty six years. He died in 2010 after struggling manfully with Parkinson’s disease for the twelve years following his retirement.

I had a minor contretemps with him one night and was later congratulated by one of the production staff. It was rare for anybody to fall out with Peter, especially in public. He was a steadfastly uncompromising sort of person with a predilection for irascibility and an international reputation, the sort of credentials which give a person a certain air of invincibility. One of the actresses I knew called him ‘a gnomey Napoleon.’ Being short in stature but big in most other ways, that’s probably about right.

I doubt that anybody reading this post will have heard of Peter Cheeseman, but the reason for making it is this: However much you disagreed with his reasons for doing or demanding something, you always knew that those reasons were based on honestly held beliefs in the rights and needs of humanity. He was as straight as they come, and that’s rare.